Page:Green Mansions 1904.djvu/127

Rh for you to throw leaves on me, and to be glad when you are glad?"

"Oh yes."

"Then let us make a compact. I shall do everything to please you, and you must promise to do everything to please me."

"Tell me."

"Little things, Rima—none so hard as chasing you round a tree. Only to have you stand or sit by me and talk will make me happy. And to begin you must call me by my name—Abel."

"Is that your name? Oh, not your real name! Abel, Abel—what is that? It says nothing. I have called you by so many names—twenty, thirty—and no answer."

"Have you? But, dearest girl, every person has a name—one name he is called by. Your name, for instance, is Rima, is it not?"

"Rima! only Rima—to you? In the morning, in the evening . . . now in this place and in a little while where know I? ... in the night when you wake and it is dark, dark, and you see me all the same. Only Rima—oh, how strange!"

"What else, sweet girl? Your grandfather Nuflo calls you Rima."

"Nuflo?" She spoke as if putting a question to herself. "Is that an old man with two dogs that lives somewhere in the wood?" And then, with sudden petulance, "And you ask me to talk to you!"

"Oh, Rima, what can I say to you? Listen"

"No, no," she exclaimed, quickly turning and putting